


Everything In Its Place

by ooinugirloo



Category: Teen Wolf (TV)
Genre: Derek Hale is Bad at Feelings, Gen, Insecure Derek, Magical Stiles Stilinski, Pack Feels, Tattooed Stiles
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2013-08-01
Updated: 2013-08-01
Packaged: 2017-12-22 02:07:27
Rating: Not Rated
Warnings: Creator Chose Not To Use Archive Warnings
Chapters: 1
Words: 2,979
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/907613
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/ooinugirloo/pseuds/ooinugirloo
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>When the pack of children Derek had collected spread out across the country to go to college, Derek figured that he, and Beacon Hills, would fade into their pasts, and that they'd all be happier that way.</p>
<p>Derek should have remembered that these kids never did what he expected them to.</p>
            </blockquote>





	Everything In Its Place

Claws rending soft skin, bones snapping like matchsticks, death and pain: the two companions you can never outrun,  _family or pack_ , they followed you here, trapped you like prey, strung you up like meat,  _I don’t know whether to kill it or lick it_ , not again,  _it’s not your fault_ , it always is, always you, get out now, get away, run run runrunrun—

Derek jerked upright, red-eyed and snarling. Scrubbing his hands over his face, the alpha shuddered; he hated the nightmares. Hated the reminder of how little he could control, of how powerless he was. Hated how the ghosts of monsters long dead still held power over him. He shook his head lightly—his pack was safe. They were all grown, into their skins and their lives. It had been years since there was a real threat to Beacon Hills, years since Kate Argent and the Alpha Pack. His pack was stable, off at school as they should be. The urge he had to call them each was senseless, and probably unwelcome.  _They left_ , he reminded himself.  _They left to live their own lives. Don’t drag them down into yours_.

*

When Derek finally padded downstairs 20 minutes later, his arrival was met with silence, a note left on the counter.

_Hey Bro,_

_I got a call about a thing and had to run, but don’t forget to stop by the store and pick up eggs and something for dinner, unless you want to get pizza for the 4_ th time this week.  
Catch ya later!  
Cora

“Mother-henning, free-loading little sisters…” Derek grumbled. It was Saturday, so his sister was likely to be out until dinner. Derek glanced at the paperback he had lying on the couch, but the residual nervous tension from his dream made him want to  _move_. Grabbing his keys and shrugging on his leather jacket, Derek figured he might as well go get the eggs so Cora would have one less thing to nag him about later.

*

What Derek had forgotten, though, was how crowded the Beacon Hills supermarket was at midday on Saturdays. Every little old lady in a 15-mile radius seemed to be shuffling around the refrigerated section, making everything around him smell of talcum powder and mints. Nose twitching slightly, Derek waded carefully into the sea of grannies, grabbed a dozen eggs and was turning around to make his escape when a well-known scent cut through the aging perfume.

_Grass after a rain/apples/ozone/cardamom/herbs_

Hazel eyes snapped up and locked on to a familiar face an instant before Stiles looked over and noticed him staring.

“Derek!”

Abandoning whatever produce he had been after, Stiles made his way over, moving easily around the geriatric crowd with grace his younger self had never possessed. He wasn’t half as gangly anymore—he had grown into his broad shoulders and the formerly coltish limbs now boasted actual muscle. Grinning broadly, he stopped in front of Derek, hands in his pockets.

“Hey, big guy! Long time no see. How’s things?”

It had been a long time. Stiles had gone to school 4 years ago and only come back for a few days at Christmas each year. He and Cora had exchanged numbers, so she gave Derek periodic updates on him, and it sounded like he was doing well. He managed to escape the insanity of his high school years and make a life for himself, and Derek was happy for him, he really was.

“Fine,” Derek managed, after a too-long pause. “Aren’t you supposed to be in school? 

“It’s summer, dude. Also, I graduated. I’m staying at home while I figure out where to go from here.” He pulled his right hand out of his pocket and gestured vaguely around, as if to imply that he would pluck his future plans from thin air. Derek’s eyes locked onto Stiles’s forearm, tracing swirls of black and red that certainly had not been there the last time Derek had seen him. Noticing his staring, Stiles ran his fingertips over the tendrils peeking out from the bottom of his customary plaid shirt.

“Ah, noticed the ink, I see.” His grin turned into more of a smirk. “A boy’s gotta protect himself, Big Bad.”

Derek’s brows furrowed. Stiles laughed. “Still communicating mainly via your eyebrows, huh? I’ve missed this town. Anyway, I’ve gotta go before my dad’s frozen yogurt melts. I’ll see you around, Derek.”

With that, the younger man turned and strode away, humming jauntily. Derek frowned slightly, left holding a carton of eggs with a suspiciously light feeling in his chest.

_‘Don’t be an idiot,’_  he told himself fiercely,  _‘he isn’t back to stay. He missed his dad, his hometown, not you. He’s going to leave, and that’s fine. It’s better for everyone.’_

Unsettled, he paid for his eggs and left the store, got into the Camaro and drummed his fingers on the wheel. He didn’t want to go back to his quiet, empty apartment. He felt antsy; he wanted to do something—to  _run_. Rolling his shoulders, Derek started the car and reversed, taking a left out of the parking lot towards the Beacon Hills Preserve. 

*

_Trees, dirt, fur, blood, bird—_

He ran sometimes, when his human skin felt too small. He shifted and ran on four legs, pacing the trails his family had worn into the forest for years. He ran all around the town, ran until his muscles burned and his scent lay in a thick layer, providing whatever protection it could for his pack-that-never-was.

_—pollen, flowers, mushrooms, smog—_

Everything was simple to the wolf. There was only what he could see and smell and hear and feel and taste. There were straightforward emotions. There was the love of pack, and the joy of running, the excitement of the hunt, and the anger at enemies. He could forget, for a time, the complexities of being a man, and live for a while with only his animal instincts.

_—water, smoke, ozone, pack, Stiles!_

Reorienting himself towards the boy’s smell, the wolf loped closer. He was curious, ( _why was Stiles in the woods_ ) happy, ( _the woods would smell like pack_ ) and worried ( _why was Stiles alone in the woods where there could be danger_ ). He could hear him humming, could hear the crunch of dead grass under his sneakers when he moved. Just as the wolf bounded into the clearing, Stiles turned, eyes seeming to flash for a moment in the low light.

“Oh, hey there, Derek! I haven’t seen you all full-wolf in quite a while. Patrolling the territory, huh?”   
  
The wolf chuffed, pleased, ( _Stiles recognized his pack_ ) and walked over, nosing at the boy’s stomach. The boy smelled strongly of ozone, blocking out the sweeter notes of his scent, and it was unfamiliar to the wolf. The boy didn’t seem to be distressed, though, as he rested a hand gently on the wolf’s head. Still, the boy was asking for trouble walking in the woods alone, so the wolf growled slightly, butting his head into the boy’s abdomen.

“What, you thought you were the only one who could wander around the Preserve at dusk? I hate to be the bearer of bad news, dude, but idiot teenagers have been doing it since the dawn of time, so you can stop giving me the grumpy wolf glare and walk with me if you’re so concerned about creepy crawlies coming to eat me.”

The wolf huffed and began to trot towards the scent of motor  _oil/rubber/metal_ , glancing back impatiently when the boy failed to follow.

“Wha—you’re seriously walking with me? You’re walking me to my car. You’re secretly a gentleman. Gentlewolf. Oh man, you’re ridiculous.”

The boy fell into step with the wolf, though, and started humming again a few minutes later, brushing his fingers along the tree trunks as they walked. Loping the last few meters towards the boy’s trademark Jeep, the wolf pawed lightly at the door.

“Alright, alright, hold onto your whiskers, Fido. I think I’ve got a spare pair of pants in here too—” the boy rummaged around in the backseat for a moment, “—yep, got ‘em! They’ll probably be a little tight, but it’s not like you aren’t used to that.” The boy tossed them lightly, leaning against the car as the wolf caught them and padded into the trees to change.

Emerging moments later on two feet, Derek shifted uncomfortably in the predictably too-tight pants. He got his first real look at Stiles and, having shed his plaid shirt at some point, his tattoos. There were dark, bold lines circling his wrists and weaving their way up his forearms, laced together like Celtic knots. Running throughout was a thin red line that didn’t seem to have a beginning or an end. The designs were different on each arm, and encircled his arm like bands with different motifs in each. One looked a bit like the scales of a fish, one feathers, leaves, waves, and then just geometric and organic shapes. These continued most of the way up his arms, interspersed with symbols that looked like runes and sigils. Blinking, Derek turned his attention to the amused whiskey-colored gaze of the object of his focus.   
  
“They’re insurance, mostly.” Stiles broke the silence, “It turns out that my ‘spark’ was more like a flamethrower. Once I turned it on, it was more powerful and harder to control than anyone had expected. It also made me a bigger target. After a couple of incidents, I met some people at school who trained me and taught me to use the spark, instead of it using me. The ink helps me channel my power, focus it on doing something specific, rather than just causing explosions and electrical shorts everywhere.”

“So that’s where the smell of ozone was coming from.” Derek confirmed.

Stiles kicked off of the Jeep to pace over to the tree line. “Yep. Apparently, my specific type of magic is innately elemental, and expresses itself as electricity when I don’t give it any other outlet. It puts a whole new spin on the phrase ‘blowing a fuse’, lemme tell you.”

Derek snorted inelegantly, crossing his arms. There had always been something electric about Stiles, something in the way he could never sit still, in how his mind was always racing. “Just don’t electrocute yourself, Sparky.”

“Oh, Big Bad made a funny! Very good, Jokes McGee, make fun of the magic kid. What’s next, suggesting an orthodontist to a vampire?” Stiles grumbled, but he was smiling. “Alright, man, it’s late, I’m headed home. You good?” At Derek’s nod he continued, “Cool, see you later!

As the Jeep made its way out of the forest, Derek tried to quash the warm feeling in his chest singing  _packpackpack_.  _‘Stop that.’_  he thought at the part of himself that was most purely wolf  _‘That’s probably all you’ll see of him. They aren’t yours—they never were.’_

*

It wasn’t, though. Stiles was suddenly everywhere in Derek’s life. If it wasn’t bumping into him around town, it was him and Cora lounging around Derek’s apartment, watching movies and eating pizza, whining at Derek until he joined in.

The next time Stiles showed up at Derek’s apartment, he had Scott and Allison in tow. “Hey dude,” Stiles said, shrugging out of his hoodie, “Scott and Allison just got back, so I figured we could turn this into a pack movie night.” Derek rolled his eyes, ignoring the stirring of the wolf in his chest, and went to order more pizzas.

Every time after that the group got larger as the rest of them came back from school. First it was Isaac, physically dragged in and force-cuddled by Stiles and Scott. Then it was Lydia after she texted Allison wanting to know where she was. Derek’s apartment had never been so loud before. They all started hanging out there when they didn’t have anything better to do. It was during one of those nights that Scott leaned over and grabbed something hanging from a cord around Stiles’s neck. “Dude, what’s up with this necklace?”

It was round, about the size of a silver dollar. The base of it was a rich, variegated, brown wood, but the most prominent design was a metallic Celtic trinity knot, the inner loop of which was smaller than the overall circumference of the pendant, but its 3 triangle-like points extending out past the rest of the necklace. The trinity knot was inlaid into a complicated pattern of carved woodwork; designs clear in both the positive and negative space. Just beneath the trinity knot was a burgundy-colored pentagram. The points of the star lined up with the arms of the knot above it, and its outer circle marked the edge of the pendant. In the empty spaces of the overlapping trinity knot and pentagram there were painstakingly carved Celtic knots filling up all of the negative space.

“It’s for protection, bro. It’s not like there aren’t any supernatural baddies in SoCal, y’know. The wood is Rowan—more commonly known as Mountain Ash in werewolf-y circles—the pentagram is for repelling evil, and is dyed red with the Holly berry for an extra kick. The triquetra is a cousin to the triskelion and has mostly the same meanings—basically whatever set of 3 things you want it to mean. It’s iron, which is a general supernatural-deterrent.” Stiles shrugs, as though it was no big deal.

After some impressed tittering from the rest of the pack, they quieted and went back to watching the movie. Derek was continually surprised by the ease of their interaction and their comfort in his home, and tried to convince himself it didn’t mean anything.

 *

The next morning a raven was left on Stiles’s windowsill, throat slashed and bled dry. The morning after that, on Scott’s doorstep; then Isaac’s, Lydia’s and Derek’s, in turn. Every time they found one Stiles got more withdrawn and pale, dark smudges growing under his eyes. It was like the Alpha Pack debacle all over again—no one knew what was happening, everyone braced for the next hit, tense and cagey. The werewolves were particularly snappy, claws popping out at the least provocation.

It was during a strategy meeting about a week after the first raven that tensions came to a head. Everyone was gathered at Derek’s apartment, Cora griping about how she no longer had any  _goddamned privacy_. Stiles, wrung out and exhausted, shot back that his  _family is more important than your goddamned privacy_. The next moment, Cora lunged, claws catching in the fabric and flesh on his chest as he dodged backwards. In the dead silence, the sound of Stiles’s amulet hitting the ground was like a gunshot. Not even a second after the necklace left his body, Stiles doubled over in pain and vanished into thin air.

*

The next few minutes were chaotic—Cora frozen in place, face stricken, clear of every trace of wolf except the telltale smears of Stiles’s blood on her fingertips, everyone else shouting and panicking. No one had the slightest clue where Stiles had been spirited off to until Isaac noticed that the fallen amulet was vibrating slowly across the floor. Derek scooped it up, and was immediately tugged westward, towards the Preserve.

( _“Why do these things always happen in the Preserve?”_  Isaac whined, high and lupine.   
 _“Because it’s easier to hide blood in soil than on concrete.”_  Lydia replied quietly.)

Everyone piled into Allison’s Toyota and were at the Preserve in record time. A few feet into the forest, the wolves caught the faintest scent of Stiles’s blood—a smudge left on a tree trunk, as though placed there purposefully. A meter further there was another trace, and another, and another. The group followed the scent trail deep into to forest, and after several minutes began to make out the sounds of a man’s voice ahead of them.   
  
 _“—should really thank that beast for cutting that protection spell off of you, otherwise I wouldn’t have been able to get my hands on you half as easily. Shhh, it’s okay, my little spark, you won’t feel a thing. And when I’m done, I’ll take your memories, so you won’t even know it happened.”_

Stiles’s snarl was sub-vocal, underlying the popping and sparking of electricity and the man’s pained shout. Derek put on speed, catching a glimpse of the two from the tree line.

“Ugh, you’ve been tainted by the company you keep, little witch. Do try to be civilized when you deal with humans.” He spat, throwing Stiles down from where he had been slung over his shoulder. Most of his attention seemed to be going towards keeping the younger boy magically bound and gagged, allowing the wolves to sneak in close.

The instant the man’s back is turned, they leapt—but were repelled by a force field of some kind. Stiles renewed his struggles, smelling like a lightning storm, grass scorching beneath him. The man seemed to be unable to keep both Stiles and the werewolves incapacitated, allowing the younger boy to get his arms free and crawl towards his abductor.

“Zap zap motherfucker.” Stiles panted, pressing electrified palms to the man’s unprotected back. The man jolted, eyes rolling back, and Derek took the opportunity, slitting the man’s throat in a blink.

Everyone watched as the unknown man slumped to the ground, forest gone silent around them.

“He didn’t even buy me dinner.” Stiles sniffed, looking put out.

Helping him up off the ground, Derek found himself wanting to say something.

“Good to have you back.” He bit out, gruff and embarrassed.

Stiles smiled at him, weary but whole, and replied “It’s good to be back.”

And in that moment, looking around at the bruised, bloodstained kids standing around him in the hazy purple of pre-dawn, air full of laughter and love, Derek believed him.


End file.
